Jasper County Democrat, Volume 15, Number 25, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 June 1912 — MARSHALL URGES PAROLE OF RADER [ARTICLE]

MARSHALL URGES PAROLE OF RADER

Determined to Thwart Justice In Bridge Graft Gases EXECUTIVE'S PECULIAR ACTION In This Case Disgusts Indianapolis News, a Paper That Has Been One of His Chief Supporters.

Governor Marshall seems determined to thwart the carrying out of the law in the conviction of C. L. Bader for bridge grafting in Jasper county, and has personally asked the board of parole to grant the petition filed with him this week by the twin daughters of the' convicted man. What action the board will take remains to be seen, but yesterday’s Indianapolis Star stated that before acting on the governor’s request for a parole, Harry B. Darling and Thomas A. Daily, two members of the board, stated that they would make a trip to this county and to Winamae to investigate the merits of the Bader petition. The Star adds: “Governor Marshall has shown a personal interest in the case,” and that “strong political influences are back of Bader’s attempt to gain a parole.”

As heretofore stated by The Democrat, Governor Marshall’s “personal interest” in this case has been such that the people of the community swindled by the systematic steals of Bader have been wholly ignored, and much of the lesson to grafters by the conviction has been lost by the unparalleled favors and “personal interest” of the little man who is bobbing about in the executive chair at the state house. The Indianapolis News, whose representative made a personal investigation of the bridge gra'ts here and felt called upon to severely criticise the governor editorially for his uncalled for . interference with the administration of the law in this case, has the following to say about the present petition tc parole Mr. Bader:

The state board of pardons yesterday afternoon took up the question whether Clinton L. Bader of Winamac, the bridge grafter and a man to whom already have been extended favors which for their numbers and iinportance are without parallel in the history of the treatment of convicted men in Indiana, shall be released from the Indiana state prison, without being compelled to serve his minimum sentence. It is expected that the board will not pass on the Bader case until its September session. The present session ends tomorrow, and there is not sufficient time for investigation. The case was not on the schedule, but came before the board when Governor Marshall himself filed the petition and requested the board to parole Bader. John L. Burton, a real estate and loan man of Winamac, but not a resident of the community, defrauded by the crime for which Bader was convicted, dwelt at great length on the touching aspects of the case. In his long presentation, which told of the crippled man who had struggled hard to acquire financial standing, had succeeded, and then had lost all and had gone to prison, leaving a heartbroken family, there was little to suggest to the board that behind the whole case was the grim specter of the wholesale bridge grafts in Indiana and the fact that Che Bader case was the first hard blow ever dealt in this state to crooked bridge men and the first in which a bridge grafter of the “higher up” type had been sentenced to pay the penalty the statute imposes or looting the p.iblic. Bader, a democratic politician, and manager of the Winamac Bridge company, was convicted of presenting a false and fraudalent claim against Jasper county, the trial at Rensselaer showing that in a bridge for which he had the contract, he had put steel which weighed only 65 per cent, df the weight he had contracted to put into it. He had, nevertheless, made affidavit that he had performed the contract according to specifications, and had collected the full contract price. Burton, in his presentation yesterday, also failed to tell the board that six other indictments for graft on other bridges had been returned against Bader. Burton’s story to the pardon board was that Bader in 1909 had obtained a contract for five bridges in Jasper county, and had until late in the year to put the bridges up. There was a great clamor among the farmers of Jasperi

county, he said, to have the bridges put up at once, so they could move their threshing machinery. The commissioners sought to get Bader to proceed with the bridges at once, notwithstanding the time specified in the contract, said Burton, but Bader said he had no steel on hand except that which was much lighter than the contract called for. An agreemeut was made, said Burton, by which Bader by putting up the bridges at once was to be permitted to use the lightweight steel. At one time in his argument burton said if Bader rightfully belonged in the penitentiary, the oounty commissioners and the county auditor of Jasper county, and the other officers of the Winamaf Bridge company also should have been sent.

Burton also charged that the case against Bader was due not only to the hostility of the Lafayette Bridge company, but to a fight between the judge of the circuit court and the prosecutor in Jasper county for political supremacy. He said Judge Hanley did not believe that there was anything in the case, and at one time had said he would suspend sentence if the prosecutor obtained a conviction. Burton did not refer, however, to the story which came from Rensselaer at the time to the effect that the judge had intended to suspend sentence, but before doing so had a personal friend, who was a civil engineer, make an examination of the bridges put up by Bader’s company, and finding that practically all were short weight, and therefore frauds on the county, had decided not to suspend sentence. No statement from Judge Hanley was before toe pardon board yesterday, but the twin daughters of Bader, who circulated the petition for a . pardon, said that Judge Hanley had said he would neither favor nor oppose the petition. Asked by Thomas A. Daily, of the pardon board, whether there had not been rumoys of the commissioners having been mixed up in the graft cases, Burton said there had been some rumors, but nothing more than rumors. He did not refer to the fact that Prosecutor Fred Longwell had

prosecuted Bader and the three commissioners on the charge of altering a public record, by changing the figures in Bader’s bid on one bridge from *1,240 to *1.400, after the contract was let. The trial of the four men at Rens-

-e!aer was begun, -but after two .tne.-srs only had been u^ed. Longa-;; :hrvw up the case and a verdict of not guilty was return-j ed. Bader's case firs' attracted widespread attention, when, on March IS. 1910, Governor Marshall pa-1 roled Bader, permitting him to remain out of prison, while his ap-i peal., to the supreme court was pending. *1 here was indignation at the Governor's action in many quart.-rJ, :•>.•! one letter at least; trom Ja.-per. county infornied the Governor .hat "We wan: grat eliminated from public contracts A-'-'* i Bauer was. found guilty byi a jury in Jasper county, some little time elaj'.-i d l.etore lit- was sep-; tt reed lit. was allowed to go' !: ;a'.e to W; a a mac and look after; his business. He was then under! bona. Y. hen Judge Hanley bec-j teheed him to the state prison for] a, . .:i of ’ to iourti eh- years. 1 iioivi ivr. ; !.•<.- bond became void, •in .re li.i- ha ! the .•oimiiitnien; on: and d.it ected Sheriff L. P. j Shirer to lake Badef to tin pentituuarv. Shir r dirobeyed the order of the court, aid tuok Bader to Wiuamac. where lie turned aim loose, while M. M. Hathaway, president,, oi the bridge company, a prominent democratic politician and a friend o 'Govta no: Mai;hall, hastened to Indianapolis and was successful in obtaining a parole. Judge Hanley cited Sinrer for contempt i:i turning loose a prisoner he had been ordered to take the penitentiary. Shirer swore* he did so the advice of Hathaway anil George Williams. an attorney for Bader, who had told him that tie had five days in which to obey the court's order. Hathaway and Williams made affidavit that this wa- not true, and shirer was fined SIOO for contempt oi court.

When news o. the action of Governor Marshall in paroling Bader reached Jasper county, the grand jury again got busy, the six additional graft indictments were returned, and the alteration :of public records affidavit was- filed, j Citizens of the defrauded county at that time Were demanding that ! j Bader be brought to justice, in 1 j spite of the treatment different J j from that of other convicts he I j was receiving. Examination of! ( Bader's bridges fay professors of | i engineering- at Purdue" developed. I iit was said, that Bader usually putj i up cheaper bridges in Jasper county j titan ; he was paid for. .( i- The supreme court about a year [ago affirmed Bader’s conviction. refusing to hold that he should Igo free because there had been an (absence of quotation marks at the j end of the copy of the fraudulent [claim set out in the indictment, i and also refusing to support his j contention that the ‘charge that he j 'knowingly presented a false claim.’’ j did not charge that he knew the j claim was false. After the decision iof the supreme court-. Bader was j allowed to go to prison without j guard. Within six- months of the i time lie arrived at tne pgisoh. he was desired as a witness in a civil suit in Winamac. Governor Marshall granted him a temporary parole. . Warden Fogarty allowed Bader to leave the prison five days before he was* waited as a witness. and as a result he spent Thanksgiving day at home with his family. . Governor Marshall suggested to Fogarty that if he thought Bader could be trusted to do so, he be permitted to leave the prison unattfeded. Hence, he went home on - his, vacation - from prison without any guard to look after him. Bader is hot yet eligible to come before the board with a petition for parole because he has not yet served the' minimum sentence, but Governor Marshall made the request’'“on his own hook.”